Description:
This data set contains responses of South African legible voters in the 2009 National elections citizens aged 18 years and older.
In terms of the number of voting stations, a 100% realisation rate was achieved. All 400 selected voting stations were therefore visited on Election Day. The number of voters interviewed was 13 882 from the expected 14,000 which represented 99% response rate and the data set contains 55 variables.
The questionnaire questions included the distance traveled to the voting station, means of transport utilised, time spent in the voting queue, perception of IEC officials' competence, and perception of the freeness and fairness of the election.
Abstract:
The objective of the 2009 Election Satisfaction Survey (ESS) -Voters was to determine opinions and perceptions of voters on Election Day. The main intention of the survey was to determine if elections were free and fair. A further aim of the study was to assess the operational efficiency of the Electoral Commission in managing the 2009 National elections.
Four hundred voting stations throughout South Africa were selected using complex sample design. Around 50 randomly selected voters were interviewed at each of the 400 voting stations. The prime target population was therefore individuals aged 18+ who reside in South Africa and who were registered to vote in the 2009 National Elections-and voted. As voters exited these voting stations they were interviewed. The study method comprised a brief (5-minute) face-to-face interview.
The HSRC together with the IEC developed the voter questionnaire. Questions included the distance travelled to the voting station, means of transport utilised, time spent in the voting queue, perception of IEC officialsâ competence, and perception of the freeness and fairness of the election.
Face-to-face interview
The study was conducted among South Africans who voted in the 2009 National Elections. The target population for the voter component of the study was individuals aged 18 years and older who were registered to vote in the 2009 Elections.
A complex sample design was used in drawing the sample of voting stations. The design included stratification and a multi-stage sampling procedure. The database of voting stations obtained from the IEC was merged with that of Population Census Enumeration Areas (EAs). The sampling of the voting station was done proportionally to the dominant race type, geo-type and the number of voting stations in a given province. This was to ensure that a nationally representative sample of voting stations was selected and the results of the survey could be properly weighted to the population of legible voters in the country. At the actual voting stations, fieldworkers used random sampling to select voters to ensure a fair representation in terms of gender, race, age, and disability status.
In the cases of Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal, the numbers of voting stations were sampled below proportion âgiven that almost half of the South African registered voters are based in these provinces. Conversely, the number of voting stations in the Northern Cape was over-sampled in order to generate sufficient interviews in that province to facilitate meaningful analysis. Table 1 provides the distribution of voting stations per province and the number of voters interviewed.
At each voting station, the interviewer was instructed to interview 35 voters during the course of the day. Interviews were divided into four time slots: 07:00 - 10:30; 10:31 â 14:00; 14:01 â 17:30 and the remainder between 17:31 and closing time (21:00). This was done to ensure a spread of interviews throughout Election Day, since it was imagined that different dynamics might be at play depending on the time of day.
In terms of the number of voting stations, a 100% realisation rate was achieved. All 400 selected voting stations were therefore visited on Election Day. The number of voters interviewed was 13 882 from the expected 14,000 which represented 99% response rate.
